They said they also wanted to reduce the amount of times vehicles were being taken off the road for repairs after a collision.

Nicky Fothergill, in charge of driving at EMAS, said: "Our staff are often driving in high-risk situations and accidents are not always their fault.

"When people see blue lights and hear a siren, they can react unpredictably and in ways our staff can't always anticipate.

"But there are things we can do to help. One of those is spotting any problems which could lead to something – like making sure drivers are reversing properly – before they happen.

"These driving instructors will be able to help us do that because, while we have people doing this at the moment, some are operational paramedics and others are tutors – both of whom have other responsibilities too."

Between April 2013 and March this year, there were 404 incidents involving ambulance vehicles which EMAS reported to its insurers. There were 462 incidents in the previous 12 months and, so far this financial year up to May, there have been 65. These include instances where ambulance vehicles have clipped mirrors, hit parked cars or reversed incorrectly.

Ms Fothergill, clinical education manager and driving lead for EMAS, said: "Over the last year, we can see that the number of incidents has decreased but some types of incidents have actually gone up. The number of times where vehicles have hit stationary objects has increased, as has the number of incidents where the vehicle was reversing.

"But the amount of times vehicles are clipping mirrors and hitting third-party vehicles has gone down, while incidents where the handbrake has not been applied correctly are about the same."

Ms Fothergill said other measures they were looking to introduce included regular refresher training for workers.

But she said they already sent out regular bulletins to staff about driving and issues to be aware of, such as speeding – particularly approaching winter.

7 comments

I am not saying they don't do a good job, they do without them my husband would not be here.
I just think they need to be a bit more careful when on emergency calls, as we all know innocent people have been involved in accidents which were not there fault.

If it were a fire engine the crew would get out and tip the car on its side to make way through, and yes I have seen it done where a junction was blocked by people in a chip shop who were too idle to come out and move their vehicles when they were blocking the road to a fire engine with blue lights showing.

The staff in these vehicles are about to attend a life or death situation and should be treated with respect and courtesy as required. They should not be exonerated if they as a previous poster experienced disregard red lights or any highway law in operation. However these vehicles are insured and should be driven with respect for all other drivers. Defensive driving as taught in the IAM may well assist them in dealing with these circumstances but maybe these present drivers are simply not good enough and able to reach the high standards required. It might be an idea if the Police belonging to the same council offer their specialist driving instructors who are a totally capable. They are probably also paid by the same authority and saving money instead of hiring £20 per hour instructors used to normal controlled road driving.

This is a misleading headline as not all accidents are the fault of the ambulance and they are covered by insurance; and a lot of motorists are not spatially aware and this is regularly seen by myself when you pull over in a safe place to let an ambulance past before its anywhere near you. Suddenly lots of cars overtake you because they haven't seen the approaching ambulance because they're not concentrating and looking in their mirrors, despite a cacophony of blue lights and loud sirens.

In my opinion alot of the drivers need training as they have no regard for any other road users.
I know that from past experience having had our car written off by a paramedic going through a red light and smashing into us which may i add we had to take 50/50 blame.
Also coming home from work last week was faced with an ambulances speeding towards us on our side of the road and we had to slam our breaks on to avoid a head on crash.
So please teach them that there are other road users on the road that drive sensibly.